You're all very kind. I was going to post the obituary notice for Lana, which Val wrote of course, but can't find that section of the $%^&*( paper. Here's something I wrote about Dad though.

My dad, George Ewen Cameron, was born in Glasgow a few months before the First World War started. (Something which continues to amaze me the more I think about it.) His family emigrated to Canada in 1919, settling in Winnipeg.

My dad was a complicated Scottish soul. He was a gifted scientist, a fine piano player, a dedicated and unrepentant socialist and a student of history. He could have been a successful artist had that been the path he chose; I have seen some drawings he did as a teenager and they are stunningly detailed work. I have no idea why he didn't keep it up, and hardly ever drew during my lifetime, except that he was a multi-talented man and his interests and choices took him elsewhere.

Many of my friends enjoyed great friendships with my dad, for his openness, sense of humour and tendency towards fiery leftist rhetoric made him a person you could have a memorable conversation with over a glass of whiskey. As I mentioned, he was a musician, and he was a big supporter of my own musical endeavours. In fact, I have had more different jobs than any normal person, and he was proud of me when I was a cab driver, a literacy teacher, a musician, a forestry technician, or whatever it is I'm doing now. Didn't matter to him as long as I was doing something that was useful to somebody. The fact that he was a highly educated scientist, as he explained pointedly to me many times, didn't make him any different from anyone else in the working class, which he firmly believed is composed of everyone who has to work for a living.

He was far from perfect, could be acerbic and cutting, yet easily offended despite his easy-going nature. (Say, that doesn't sound like anyone you know, does it?)

Dad's final years were very difficult. He was suffering from both Parkinson's and Alzheimer's on top of the myotonic dystrophy which he had for his entire life. He stayed at home, thanks to Mom's heroic efforts, until the last week of his life, and died peacefully in his sleep at 4 a.m. this past Monday at the Perley Rideau Veteran's Residence, where he was receiving excellent round-the-clock palliative care since he lost consciousness Friday afternoon. Thankfully, pneumonia took him before he reached the stage of the disease where the patient doesn't remember those closest to him. He always knew who we were.

Please don't sorrow for his passing or for my family and myself; seeing him lying still was infinitely less painful for me than watching this extremely intelligent man struggle for breath, for words, and for thoughts. We loved him but we have let him go.

Dad loved a good concert, of any kind. We took him to see Natalie MacMaster a couple of years ago, at his request after he saw her picture in the paper. (Yes, he always had an eye for the women and was an affectionate greeter--he claimed it was a Scottish thing.) And I brought him to Archie Fisher concerts twice--Dad and Archie are both Glasgow-born. One of my fondest memories will be the past few months when I played for him as he lay in his bed, which he rarely left this year. Music made him so happy. Emily and I sang to him for the last time on Sunday, with no idea whether or not he could hear anything. But we're glad we did.

He was a Scottish Canadian working class intellectual and he fought the good fight.

Annnnhhhh, I'm gettin all misty again.

Bill